<p>I have not taken many AP classes. How can I offset that? What can I do to make up for that? Is it even possible.</p>
<p>I’ve only taken 2 honors freshman year, 1 IB class junior, and 2 IB classes my senior year.</p>
<p>If the reason that you haven’t taken more rigorous courses is that your school doesn’t offer them, colleges will take that under consideration.</p>
<p>Otherwise, however, I can’t think of anything that you can do except take some college courses or rigorous high school courses over the summer or via the Internet during the fall.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, if your grades are good, there are plenty of colleges that will accept you. The places that won’t (assuming that you passed on taking rigorous courses your h.s. offered) are the very top private colleges.</p>
<p>Agree with Northstarmom. Not going to get into HYPS without something incredible going for you, but that’s plenty good for some good LAC’s, assuming your other resume pieces are in place.</p>
<p>Northstarmom is right on track. Research the type of school that will be a good “match” for you and really apply yourself there. CC is rather extreme in the fact that it’s populated by HYPS-type hopefuls. The reality is that there are only a few thousand slots in these schools whereas there are 100,000s of open 1st year college slots – offering excellent opportunities.</p>
<p>Good luck to you.</p>
<p>If you have great grades in the classes you did take, then that will narrow the gap a little bit.</p>
<p>Well you simply may not be eligible. Would your counselors allow you to take Calc if you were in Algebra 1 the previous year? No.</p>
<p>In my case, my counselors prevented me from taking A LOT of classes due to the ones I started off in freshman year (since I came from a bad jr. high) so yah…</p>
<p>i am interesting in the answer for this too
for me i skip so many classes that i there is like no honors i can take anymore (chem honors, pre-calc honors)</p>
<p>and for me as a immigrant, though not that NEW, but still can’t compete in a competitive school (70% Asian) in English , i am not taking any humanities APs
i’ll only have 5 ap(maybe 6 if i take the physics C tests), and 1 honors by that end of my senior year
with 2-4 community college math/physics classes</p>
<p>am i screwed for a college like Caltech or MIT?</p>
<p>bump!</p>
<p>interested in other’s response</p>
<p>Have great test scores and great EC’s to make up for the lack of rigorous courses, perhaps.</p>
<p>"and for me as a immigrant, though not that NEW, but still can’t compete in a competitive school (70% Asian) in English , i am not taking any humanities APs
i’ll only have 5 ap(maybe 6 if i take the physics C tests), and 1 honors by that end of my senior year
with 2-4 community college math/physics classes</p>
<p>am i screwed for a college like Caltech or MIT? "</p>
<p>If you can’t compete to take rigorous courses in a competitive high school in the U.S., you would not be competitive for a place like Caltech or MIT, where the students include the top students from the most competitive high schools in the U.S. and elsewhere. Even though Caltech and MIT are engineering-centered, one still has to have very strong skills in the humanities in order to do the writing that their classes require.</p>
<p>There are, however, many engineering schools in the U.S. where one could still gain acceptance without excellent verbal and humanities skills or even excellent math and science skills. Checking out one’s state public universities would be a good place to start.</p>
<p>well, I got A+ in my English classes for the past two years and my teachers really liked me.
I meant , I don’t really want to compete in an AP english class for the A, where people been to TASP and win all sorts of awards just for writing.
I am just not interested in spending 2 hours a night for an AP humanities class when i can spend the time taking other classes and doing things that i like (example. math, science, robotics)</p>
<p>my english is definitely not the top in the school, but it’s not bad either.
Having good logic goes a long way for both history and analytical writings.</p>
<p>is chosing not to take AP humanities really bad for CAltech and MIT?
(good thing 25% of my school gets into berkeley, so there is always UCs for back up!)</p>
<p>how many AP’s would be defined as a “rigorous course” ?
my school techically offers 14
but calc BC and AB really count as 1
and all 4 of the languages really count as 1 too
and there is AP music theory which is random
so we really only have 8ish</p>
<p>my high school is way more than just competitive, probably almost one of the most competitive.
the APUSH class for example is curved to the highest scorer on the tests (no one EVER gets perfect…). people have to get 20% higher on the tests this year than last year to get a A in the tests just cuz someone did well. etc</p>
<p>What are your SAT scores?</p>
<p>"how many AP’s would be defined as a “rigorous course” ?</p>
<p>Ask your GC as your GC will be the one who’ll have to check the box indicating the strength of your courseload.</p>
<p>If your h.s. is that difficult, I’m sure that top colleges would know about the rigor of the classes including AP English, and they still may be expecting applicants to have taken AP English. It may be that the adcoms consider a “B” in your h.s.'s AP English class the equivalent of an A+ in a less rigorous school.</p>
<p>You need to talk to your GC, however, because that’s the person who can best tell you whether you’d be hurting yourself by not taking AP English. Make sure that your GC knows that you are aspiring to colleges like CalTech.</p>
<p>One needn’t get straight As to get into top colleges.</p>
<p>well i won’t have the time to take English AP even though i kinda want to.
I’ll have AP Bio which is 2 hours a day of homework
and APCS, gov/econ, brit lit adds up to about 2 hours of homework a day
and i’ll have CC classes (physics CLASS along is like 2 hours on monday and 5 hours on thursdays(6 to11PM) and thats not counting hw)</p>
<p>and along with running our robotics team (approximately 10 hours a week, much more during build season)
and other extracurricular activities
along with writing college apps
i really don’t have the time</p>
<p>our GC doesn’t do our rec. our Vice Principal does. so gah</p>
<p>So, what are your SAT scores?</p>
<p>well 800 for SAT 2s</p>
<p>sat 1 is really bad (2090: 780m, 640 v, 670 w) right now cuz i had a bad day
retaking in oct
should be in the 2200s, trying very hard for a 2300 if possible
and taking ACT just in case</p>
<p>What SAT2s did you take?</p>
<p>This is the score to raise for the colleges you’re considering: 640 v.</p>
<p>What exactly are your ECs? Any offices? Awards?</p>
<p>i’m not trying to get “chanced”</p>
<p>just how bad is not taking humanities AP for top tech schools?</p>
<p>I don’t chance people. It’s hard to answer your question without knowing about your scores and EC. One can’t give a thoughtful answer without putting your lack of AP humanities into context.</p>
<p>One thing I’m wondering about is exactly how bad your verbal skills are in English. Judging by your SAT v, they are not remarkable for people who are going to places like MIT. If that’s the case, you may need to take AP English in order to boost your v score and show that you can survive a course that is rigorous in English. Getting a B probably would be better than taking a lower level English class and acing it. In addition, SAT scores relate to rigor of one’s curriculum, so taking the toughest English class would help boost your verbal scores.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, like most posters here, I’m a well meaning person who’s not an expert in admissions. For the best answer, you should contact the admissions office of the colleges that interest you.</p>
<p>if i get my verbal to 700s would that be better?</p>
<p>As for me, my SAT score was extremely low (1770) and my ACT was also low (28). I took the June SAT and ACT and I am anxious to get those scores back. </p>
<p>Thanks a lot for your help.</p>